The Game Ends With a Bang
by Totalitarian
Summary: 10...9...8...' It all came down to this. Just one grimy bullet would decide everything. The only question is, whose? An accurate novelisation of the final scene in the game. Spoilers abound.


Thanks to Sepetyra Navi for beta reading this. Check out A Pacification With Erasure by her if you have the time, it's a good read.

--------------------------------------------

.

.

.

.

The murder was inevitable. There was no stopping it. The only witnesses would be the cold walls of the Room of Reckoning, and the victor.

Two boys, their finest days yet to come, were now about to kill each other. One who had isolated himself from the world, had now learned the error of his ways, bonded with people he would have once ignored. The other had used him remorselessly as a pawn for a gambit that only he would call a game.

The gun pointed itself squarely at Joshua's head. Neku's mind had never been more focused – if he could fire the gun, there would be no way he would miss.

His bright orange hair drowned in his sweat, slipping down over his ears and large headphones. The life in his young face drowned in his tears.

The power in his hands drowned in his remorse.

Neku brought the damn thing down to his side, his neck content to slump in defeat. It didn't matter that his life was on the line, it didn't matter what Joshua had done, or what he was going to do – he could not kill him. The instinct wasn't in him. It never was.

Shiki and Beat, his two friends – for he had such people who he cared about now, and who cared for him in return – were frozen on the sideline. Literally. They could not help him now, nor could they help themselves. The only witness there would be to the murder was the ominous, cold black stone of the floors and walls of this infernal place.

Another tear fell down his face to the floor.

He had had enough.

The gun in his hand didn't do so much as shake in protest.

A murderer showed no regret when in the execution of his art. Only a god had the right to take life. Joshua's arm had been stretched out at Neku the whole time, his slender, deadly gun pointed with one hand squarely at Neku's forehead. Unlike his opponent in this game – for it was a game to him – Joshua's arm wasn't covered in sweat or shivering in fear. He was cool and collected as he always was. No drop of sweat may ever stain his clean, grey shirt. Neku's decision was clear – there was no need to even finish the countdown.

Joshua's eyes sharpened: he was definitely going to hit.

He let out one final giggle before let his finger choke the gun's trigger, wrapping itself around the slick metal.

Suddenly the wall behind him shattered.

Amid the speeding dust, the thousands of newborn pebbles crashing to the ground as they shattered from the impeccable marble of the vast room, a slick, blue hovering race car with powerful fiery engines on its back, sped in at 1500 kilometres an hour. The deafening roar of the Blue Falcon's engines scattered the tragedy of the scene and sent chills down Joshua's spine and feet.

_No! Not him!_ The Composer gasped, looking in fear for the first time in his life at the one factor in his plan which he hadn't accounted for. How on earth could he have possibly—

The cockpit of the racer opened as it skidded to a halt with surprising grace.

Captain Falcon leapt out of the cockpit in a tremendously high leap of athletic proportions. Vast, unparalleled energy concentrated itself within the hero's right hand, ready to be used.

"No!" Joshua cried. He swiftly turned his gun to the captain, firing all the rounds madly. All of them rebounded helplessly off of the abs from his blue-suited chest.

_**"FALCON...**_

Captain Falcon, still flying, steadied his body out of a somersault as he approached Joshua. His legs were bent, ready to add the extra thrust at the end. His fist glazed with fire, primed for the mother of all one-hit wonders.

"_**...PUNCH!!"**_

Right into Joshua's nose.

An angelic aura of righteous, bright fire immediately encircled the group, focusing intensely on the blue-coated hero and his victim. The pain of Joshua's very soul screamed a thousand times louder than the pain of his face. His eyes were pinched shut in a pathetic bid to save himself.

Silver air gushed past the Captain's yellow gloved fist as it escaped from Joshua's body. A loud scream followed, the loudest scream in all the world, shattering the window of the Blue Falcon which had skidded itself adjacent to the immobilised Shiki and Beat, blowing them over onto the ground with a gust of wind.

For what felt like eternity they were frozen in this holy execution. The captain's expression never changed from its determined smile. His fist never wavered, pushing only further and further. Finally, the last gasp of wind left Joshua's lungs, his silvery hair stopped rushing over his head and fell down, and his very body disintegrated into nothing.

The room returned to normal, its black and white self with unique stone markings. Captain Falcon brushed some dust off of his suit and wiped his visor clean of the former Composer's spit.

Neku simply used his confused eyes to stare at the man, baffled. Instinctively they twitched by the moment. His hand dropped the gun with an unceremonious thud and scratched his head in his confusion. An expletive was on the tip of his tongue for thousands of conflicting reasons.  
He wasn't sure whether he should have felt angry, vengeful or thankful.

All Neku saw then before he blacked out was a sharp salute.

"Show me your moves!" the man said, as everyone but him disappeared the room in the blink of an eye.

Composer Falcon's reign was fair, just, prosperous, and void of assholes.


End file.
